Writing

Music Writing:

I had the opportunity to interview a number of my songwriting heroes over the years as a music journalist at Exclaim!, NOW, The Coast, and SOCAN’s Words and Music.

These days I’ve taken a step back from music writing, but I’ve had the honour of helping the following artists write bios in recent years: Abigail Lapell, Laura Repo, Gillian Nicola, Emily Rockarts, Nick Sherman, and Christa Couture.

For Exclaim!:

Gillian Welch, David Rawlings, Iris DeMent, Loretta Lynn (!!), k.d. lang,  Stephin Merritt, Beth Orton, Gordon Gano and Calvin Johnson. And because some heroes are your contemporaries (or younger than you) I’ll add to that list: Farmer Dave Scher, Weyes Blood, Laura Marling and The Weather Station.

I wrote an Alvvays cover story. Then there was the week I went up to Sudbury and interviewed Kate Maki and Fred Squire about their home studio and also did an epic questionnaire over the phone with Whitehorse. I re-wrote this Essential Guide to Neko Case a number of times (and I still think I should have included Fox Confessor in my list).

But the longest thing I have ever written for Exclaim! is this Beat Happening timeline.

Some albums I loved that I reviewed: Jake Xerxes Fussell, Veda Hille, Darren Hanlon, Tanya TagaqGeoff Berner; some albums I loved and have not yet reviewed (because, sadly): Billy Bragg and Joe Henry’s Shine A Light, Tom Brosseau’s Perfect Abandon, Classic American Ballads (Smithsonian Folkways) and Introducing Karl Blau, which is a sublime collection of country soul covers.

For NOW Magazine:

The time I received a fax from Jonathan Richman.

The time I spoke with Cass McCombs after he’d just finished his stint of only speaking to female journalists.

I really like NOW’s Local Hero series. I’ve spoken to Dan Burke, Jane Bunnett and Grit Laskin for that.

Interviewing Greg Brown for a primer on his work. Interviewing Tanya Tagaq.

This tribute to Hayden’s Everything I Long For.

2016 to the beginning of 2017 brought what felt like a slew of bad news: Ken Aldcroft died, Hillside was struggling, BOFF had it’s final year, 6 Nassau closed (but then Sonology opened), scalpers took most of the tickets to the Tragically Hip, Hugh’s Room closed, then struggled to reopen. A bunch of venues closed. [edited in February 2020: people are still passing away and venues are still closing … it’s hard.]

Books:

I have written book reviews, news and features for NOW Magazine, Quill & Quire and The National Post. Here are a few:

Book City Memoir

Festival Man by Geoff Berner

The Western Light by Susan Swan

Robert Lepage’s Creative Alchemy

Algoma by Dani Couture